Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) president Thol. Thirumavalavan on Saturday said revolutionary icon Che Guevara, who renunciated identity politics, had a world vision.

Releasing the Tamil translation of the book Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life written by Jon Lee Anderson and translated by J. Deepalakshmi, Mr. Thirumavalavan said the religious and linguistic nationalism now prevailing in India is contrary to Mahatma Gandhi’s nationalism that was beyond identities such as caste and religion.

He further expressed caution about identity politics and urged youngsters to study Che Guevara to overcome such identity barriers.

Speaking at the event, CPI(M) State Secretary K. Balakrishnan said the Tamil translation would inspire youth in the State and change their perception towards society. Though Che Guevara lived only for 39 years, he travelled extensively across countries in Latin America and fought for the rights of the oppressed, he added.

Members of the Tamil Nadu Progressive Writers and Artists Association, VCK, and CPI(M) were present.

Forensic officials, who conducted the post-mortem analysis of the partially decomposed body of a man which was sent to a woman in West Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh, said it appeared that the man was murdered.

Packed in a wooden box, the body was sent to Sagi Tulasi, hailing from Yendagandi village in West Godavari district on Thursday. In a handwritten letter found in the parcel, the culprits demanded ₹1.36 crore. They warned the woman of dire consequences if amount was not paid.

Doctors, who performed a post-mortem procedure on the body at the Government General Hospital (GGH) in Eluru on Saturday, said it appeared that the victim was strangled to death.

Meanwhile, the investigating officers are trying to ascertain the identity of the victim and the motive behind the murder. The question remains as to why the body was parcelled to Ms. Tulasi, along with a threatening letter.

During questioning, the auto driver who delivered the parcel to Ms. Tulasi was understood to have told the police that a woman had called him up on his mobile phone and asked him to hand over the parcel.

The police are verifying the call records of the mobile phones of Ms. Tulasi, her sister Revati, their father Mudunuri Rangaraju, and Revati’s husband Siddharth Varma.

However, it is learnt that the mobile phones of the woman who gave the parcel to the auto driver for delivery and Siddharth Varma were switched off.

“We have sent teams to various locations to trace Siddharth Varma, who absconded soon after the parcel was delivered at Ms. Tulasi’s house at Yandagandi,” West Godavari Superintendent of Police Adnan Nayeem Asmi told The Hindu on Saturday.

“We have launched a probe to ascertain the whereabouts of the body and the reasons for the alleged murder. Efforts are on to confirm the identity of the victim,” the SP said.

The flower tribute left by the public at the entrance to the Johnneskirche following the terror attack that has left five people dead, including a small child, and over 200 injured on December 21, 2024 in Magdeburg, Germany.
| Photo Credit: Getty Images

Germans on Saturday mourned both the victims and their shaken sense of security after a Saudi doctor intentionally drove into a Christmas market teeming with holiday shoppers, killing at least five people, including a small child, and wounding at least 200 others.

Authorities arrested a 50-year-old man at the site of the attack in Magdeburg on Friday evening and took him into custody for questioning. He has lived in Germany since 2006, practicing medicine in Bernburg, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of Magdeburg. officials said.

The state governor, Reiner Haseloff, told reporters that the death toll rose to five from a previous figure of two and that more than 200 people in total were injured.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz said that nearly 40 of them “are so seriously injured that we must be very worried about them.”

Several German media outlets identified the suspect as Taleb A., withholding his last name in line with privacy laws, and reported that he was a specialist in psychiatry and psychotherapy.

Mourners lit candles and placed flowers outside a church near the market on the cold and gloomy day. Several people stopped and cried. A Berlin church choir whose members witnessed a previous Christmas market attack in 2016 sang Amazing Grace, a hymn about God’s mercy, offering their prayers and solidarity with the victims.

There were still no answers Saturday as to what motivated the man to drive his black BMW into a crowd in the eastern German city.

Describing himself as a former Muslim, the suspect shared dozens of tweets and retweets daily focusing on anti-Islam themes, criticizing the religion and congratulating Muslims who left the faith.

He also accused German authorities of failing to do enough to combat what he said was the “Islamism of Europe.” Some described him as an activist who helped Saudi women flee their homeland. He has also voiced support for the far-right and anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.

Haseloff said Friday that authorities believed the man acted alone.

The violence shocked Germany and the city, bringing its mayor to the verge of tears and marring a festive event that’s part of a centuries-old German tradition. It prompted several other German towns to cancel their weekend Christmas markets as a precaution and out of solidarity with Magdeburg’s loss. Berlin kept its markets open but has increased its police presence at them.

Germany has suffered a string of extremist attacks in recent years, including a knife attack that killed three people and wounded eight at a festival in the western city of Solingen in August.

Magdeburg is a city of about 240,000 people, west of Berlin, that serves as Saxony-Anhalt’s capital. Friday’s attack came eight years after an Islamic extremist drove a truck into a crowded Christmas market in Berlin, killing 13 people and injuring many others. The attacker was killed days later in a shootout in Italy.

Chancellor Scholz and Interior Minister Nancy Faeser traveled to Magdeburg on Saturday, and a memorial service is to take place in the city cathedral in the evening. Faeser ordered flags lowered to half-staff at federal buildings across the country.

Verified bystander footage distributed by the German news agency dpa showed the suspect’s arrest at a tram stop in the middle of the road. A nearby police officer pointing a handgun at the man shouted at him as he lay prone, his head arched up slightly. Other officers swarmed around the suspect and took him into custody.

Thi Linh Chi Nguyen, a 34-year-old manicurist from Vietnam whose salon is located in a mall across from the Christmas market, was on the phone during a break when she heard loud bangs and thought at first they were fireworks. She then saw a car drive through the market at high speed. People screamed and a child was thrown into the air by the car.

Shaking as she described the horror of what she witnessed, she recalled seeing the car bursting out of the market and turning right onto Ernst-Reuter-Allee street and then coming to a standstill at the tram stop where the suspect was arrested.

The number of injured people was overwhelming.

“My husband and I helped them for two hours. He ran back home and grabbed as many blankets as he could find because they didn’t have enough to cover the injured people. And it was so cold,” she said.

The market itself was still cordoned off Saturday with red-and-white tape and police vans every 50 meters (yards). Police with machine pistols guarded every entry to the market. Some thermal security blankets still lay on the street.

Christmas markets are a German holiday tradition cherished since the Middle Ages, now successfully exported to much of the Western world.

File photo of Chinese military survey ship Yuan Wang 5 at Hambantota International Port in Hambantota, Sri Lanka in 2022.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Sri Lanka will soon formulate a national policy on allowing visits by foreign research vessels, Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath said in Colombo on Friday (December 20, 2024), amidst frequent docking requests from Chinese surveillance ships which raised concerns in India.

Mr. Herath’s comments came days after Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s visit to India.

Also read | After India visit, Dissanayake discusses maritime research and development with China

In January, Sri Lanka enforced a year-long moratorium on foreign marine scientific research survey vessels operating in its waters and the Exclusive Economic Zone after strong security concerns were raised by India and the US following frequent docking requests from hi-tech Chinese surveillance vessels.

Sri Lanka’s moratorium on allowing research vessels is still in force which would be reviewed appropriately, Herath said.

Upon his return to Colombo from India, Mr. Dissanayake held a meeting with a top Chinese government official who expressed China’s wish to see Chinese research ships resuming their visits to Colombo. Asked if India had raised concerns over such visits during Mr. Dissanayake’s stay in India, Herath said Indian concerns were based on their national security and regional security threats.

“We assured that we will not allow any action to threaten Indian security concerns by using our land,” Mr. Herath said.

“The visit has turned out to be one which has resulted in many achievements for the people of Sri Lanka,” Mr. Herath said.

“It took the relationship to a new height,” he said.

vHerath said that India and Sri Lanka did not seal any formal agreements during vDissanayake’s visit other than signing two MoUs on training Sri Lankan public service officials and preventing dual taxation.

“We have only agreed to take forward the talks related to the Economic and Technology Cooperation Agreement (ETCA). There was no final agreement on anything,” Mr. Herath said.

When Mr. Dissanayake’s National People’s Power was not in power it had expressed bitter opposition to the agreement.

Mr. Herath also rejected allegations that Dissanayake finalized an agreement in Delhi for a direct fuel pipeline and a security pact across the Palk Strait.

“We were emphatic that we are for promoting trade and investment between the two countries,” Mr. Herath said.

Trump Media shares drop as President-elect Donald Trump transfers $4 billion worth of shares to a trust. File.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Shares of Trump Media and Technology Group slid in midday trading on Friday (December 20, 2024) after President-elect Donald Trump transferred all of his shares into a revocable trust, according to a regulatory filing.

Mr. Trump transferred all of his nearly 115 million shares — worth around $4 billion on paper — in the parent company of social networking site Truth Social as a “bona fide gift” to the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust, the Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Thursday said. Trump’s shares amount to more than half of the company’s stock.

It’s not clear why Trump transferred the stock. Donald Trump Jr. is the sole trustee and has sole voting and investment power over all securities owned by the trust.

Trump Media shares were down about 2% at midday, to $34.68 each. At one point on Friday, they were down around 6%.

Trump Media shares have been extremely volatile since the company began trading in March. They reached intraday highs close to $80 on the first day of trading, then slumped to all-time lows in September when Mr. Trump and other insiders were finally allowed to sell shares after standard lock-up agreements expired. Mr. Trump has not sold any shares in the company.

The company’s stock price has fluctuated wildly on news — good and bad — related to Mr. Trump. They tumbled after Mr. Trump’s conviction in a hush money trial in May, then surged after the first assassination attempt on Mr. Trump in July. They surged again after he won re-election in November, even as the company reported a $19.2 million third-quarter loss.

Mr. Trump created Trump Media after he was banned from Twitter and Facebook following the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

Hours to go before a midnight government shutdown, the House approved a new plan late Friday (December 20, 2024) from Speaker Mike Johnson that would temporarily fund federal operations and disaster aid, but drops President-elect Donald Trump’s demands for a debt limit increase into the new year.

Johnson insisted Congress would “meet our obligations” and not allow federal operations to shutter ahead of the Christmas holiday season. But the day’s outcome was uncertain after Trump doubled down on his insistence that a debt ceiling increase be included in any deal — if not, he said in an early morning post, let the closures “start now.”

The bill was approved 366-34, and now goes to the Senate, for expected quick passage.

“We will not have a government shutdown,” Johnson said ahead of the vote.

It was the third attempt from Johnson, the beleaguered House speaker, to achieve one of the basic requirements of the federal government — keeping it open. And it raised stark questions about whether Johnson will be able to keep his job, in the face of angry GOP colleagues, and work alongside Trump and billionaire ally Elon Musk, who have called the legislative plays this time.

Trump’s last-minute demand was almost an impossible ask, and Johnson had almost no choice but to work around his pressure for a debt ceiling increase. The speaker knew there wouldn’t be enough support within the GOP majority to pass any funding package, since many Republicans prefer to slash federal government and certainly wouldn’t allow more debt.

Instead, the Republicans, who will have full control of the White House, House and Senate next year, with big plans for tax cuts and other priorities, are showing they must routinely rely on Democrats for the votes needed to keep up with the routine operations of governing.

“So is this a Republican bill or a Democrat bill?” scoffed Musk on social media ahead of the vote.

The new 118-page package would fund the government at current levels through March and adds $100 billion in disaster aid and $10 billion in agricultural assistance to farmers.

Gone is Trump’s demand to lift the debt ceiling, which GOP leaders told lawmakers would be debated as part of their tax and border packages in the new year. Republicans made a so-called handshake agreement to raise the debt limit at that time while also cutting $2.5 trillion in spending over 10 years.

It’s essentially the same deal that flopped the night before in a spectacular setback — opposed by most Democrats and some of the most conservative Republicans — minus Trump’s debt ceiling demand.

Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries was in contact with Johnson, but Democrats were cool to the latest effort after the Republican speaker reneged on their original bipartisan compromise.

“Welcome back to the MAGA swamp,” Jeffries posted.

Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, said it looked like Musk, an unelected official and the wealthiest man in the world, was calling the shots for Trump and the Republicans.

“Who is in charge?” she asked during the debate.

Still, most Democrats approved the bill’s passage.

Trump, who has not yet been sworn into office, is showing the power but also the limits of his sway with Congress, as he intervenes and orchestrates affairs from Mar-a-Lago alongside Musk, who is heading up the incoming administration’s new Department of Government Efficiency.

“If there is going to be a shutdown of government, let it begin now,” Trump posted early in the morning on social media.

Trump does not fear government shutdowns the way Johnson and the lawmakers see federal closures as political losers that harm the livelihoods of Americans. The incoming Trump administration vows to slash the federal budget and fire thousands of employees. Trump himself sparked the longest government shutdown in history in his first term at the White House, the monthlong closures over the 2018-19 Christmas holiday and New Year period.

More importantly for the president-elect was his demand for pushing the thorny debt ceiling debate off the table before he returns to the White House. The federal debt limit expires Jan. 1, and Trump doesn’t want the first months of his new administration saddled with tough negotiations in Congress to lift the nation’s borrowing capacity. It gives Democrats, who will be in the minority next year, leverage.

“Congress must get rid of, or extend out to, perhaps, 2029, the ridiculous Debt Ceiling,” Trump posted — increasing his demand for a now five-year debt limit increase. “Without this, we should never make a deal.”

Johnson had tried at first to appease Trump’s demands, but ultimately had to work around them.

Trump and Musk unleashed their opposition — and social media army — on the original plan Johnson presented, which was a 1,500-page bipartisan compromise he struck with Democrats that included the disaster aid for hard hit states, but did not address the debt ceiling situation.

A Trump-backed second plan, Thursday’s slimmed-down 116-page bill with his preferred two-year debt limit increase into 2027, failed in a monumental defeat, rejected by most Democrats as an unserious effort — but also by conservative Republicans who refuse to pile on the nation’s red ink.

On Friday morning, Vice President-elect JD Vance and Trump’s pick to be incoming Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russ Vought, arrived early at the speaker’s office at the Capitol, where a group of holdouts from the hardline House Freedom Caucus were meeting with Johnson.

Later, during the lunchtime meeting of House Republicans in the Capitol basement, Johnson asked for a show of hands as they determined the path forward, Republican Rep. Ralph Norman said.

Government workers have already been told to prepare for a federal shutdown which would send millions of employees — and members of the military — into the holiday season without paychecks.

President Joe Biden, in his final weeks in office, has played a less public role in the debate, drawing criticism from Trump and Republicans who are trying to shift the blame for any shutdown on him.

Biden has been in discussions with Schumer and Jeffries, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Friday.

But, she said: “Republicans blew up this deal. They did, and they need to fix this.”

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer called the original agreement “the quickest, simplest, and easiest way we can make sure the government stays open while delivering critical emergency aid to the American people.”

The speaker’s election is the first vote of the new Congress, which convenes Jan. 3, and Johnson will need the support of almost every single House Republican from his razor-thin majority to ensure he can keep the gavel. Democrats will vote for Jeffries.

As the speaker twisted in Washington, his peril was on display. At Turning Point USA’s conservative AmericaFest confab, Trump ally Steve Bannon stirred thousands of activists late Thursday with a withering takedown of the Louisiana Republican.

“Clearly, Johnson is not up to the task. He’s gotta go,” Bannon said, drawing cheers. He smiled and cocked his head at the response, adding: “President Trump? These are your people.”

The Kannada literary world, which was one-sided until the 70s and 80s became more holistic by Dalit and Bandaya literature, said Kendra Sahitya Academy awardee writer Mudnakudu Chinnaswamy.

Speaking on Dalit literature at the 87th Akhila Bharata Kannada Sahitya Sammelana in Mandya, he said: “Former Minister B. Basavalingappa called Kannada literature a ‘boosa’ (cow feed) which led to a serious rethink of the premise of literature and the rise of Dalit and Bandaya literature in Karnataka.”

Basavalingappa had called Kannada literature ‘boosa’ because there were no literary works till then about the pain of downtrodden communities in Kannada literature. “Then, the Dalit movement and Dalit literature came together,” she explained.

Speaking on the topic ‘Dalit literary movement and women,’ Jayadevi Gaikwad said: “The Dalit Sangharsh Samitis (DSS) of Karnataka are like a university. In addition to Dalit issues, DSS has fought on many burning issues of the State, including farmers and labourers and others. They have also been fighting against atrocities and injustices against women,” she said.

She condemned the Union Home Minister’s derogatorily remarks about B.R. Ambedkar in Parliament recently and said that, at such times, “we women must remember Ambedkar’s contributions and we strongly stand by him.”

An earthquake of magnitude 4.8 struck Nepal. Screengrab from Twitter/@NCS_Earthquake

An earthquake of magnitude 4.8 struck Nepal in the early hours of Saturday (December 21, 2024), the National Centre of Seismology (NCS) reported. The earthquake occurred at 3:59 am Indian Standard Time (IST), the NCS noted.

The earthquake was recorded at a depth of 10 kilometres at Latitude 29.17 N and Longitude 81.59 E.

Further details are awaited.

J. Venkata Anusha, Senior Divisional Engineer (Coordination) of Guntur Railway Division, received Ati Vishisht Rail Seva Puraskar from Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw at a function held in New Delhi on Saturday. Ms. Anusha stated in a press release that it was a great honour to receive the award for excellence in track maintenance during her three-year tenure. She also extended congratulations to five awardees from the Telugu States who were part of the South Central Railway. 

Firefighters walk through a cordoned-off area near a Christmas Market, after a car drove into a crowd in Magdeburg, Germany, Saturday, December 21, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Saudi Arabia condemned the ramming attack at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg on Friday (December 20, 2024),evening, the Gulf country’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Saturday (December 21, 2024).

Police have arrested a suspect in the attack, which killed at least two people. A German official described the suspect as a doctor from Saudi Arabia who was acting alone.

The government expressed “solidarity with the German people and the families of the victims”, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on social media platform X, and “affirmed its rejection of violence”.

Saudi Arabia’s statement made no mention of the suspect.